The fact that the show is on Fox and has a more limited potential fanbase than other Abrams classics like Lost or Alias also bodes ill for the show, but my real concerns did not truly manifest until I heard of the surprisingly mixed (at best) reaction from the sci-fi nerds at Comic-Con. The kind of geekery offered by a show like Fringe is what these Comic-Con attendees salivate over (well, that and Hot Pockets). It's a double-edged sword having a screening for such a crowd because truly, no audience could be more appreciative, and at the same time, more brutally snarky and critical than a group of middle-aged Star Wars fanboys who live in their mothers' basements and have dressed up like storm troopers for the convention. Henceforth, the polarizing reviews were a minor cause for concern, but I wouldn't stake my assessment of the show on their reactions.
Anyway, Fringe premiered on Monday and I can see where the contasting reviews took shape. With J.J. at the helm, there is no way this show wouldn't be compared with Lost and Alias, and given the show's tone and basic concept, it also has to grapple with an X-Files smackdown. Three classic shows with often obssessive fanbases. Fringe had an insanely high bar to surpass and it didn't have a chance of being assessed solely on its own merits. Not an enviable position to be in... especially with Pacey as your anchor... (Not that Dawson would have been a step up or anything... [insert cold shudder] Plus, Dawson was like 34 when Dawson's Creek was actually on, so at this point, he'd have to play the crazy father character... which would actually have been kind of fun to watch--note to Fox...)
Anyway...
The basis for the show revolves around "fringe science" which apparently equates to things like mind control, reanimation, invisibility, defense against the dark arts, transfiguration, uh, algebra, you get the idea... For kicks, an FBI element (a hot, leggy blonde FBI element at that--um, yay?) has been thrown in the mix to spice things up. The premise more than smacks of the X-Files, which would be fine, but for the fact that it does not succeed as brilliantly as its predecessor. The production values are beyond reproach and the pilot was as well made and stylish as any Hollywood blockbuster, so it was by no means the look of the sho
w that was the problem. The FBI angle seemed to be aiming for Alias, but lacked the pulse-pounding, "Oh my god, Sydney, look out! It's another long lost evil aunt of yours!" thrill of the Bristow contigency. Familiarity can be like a warm, relatable blanket of nostalgia, but in this case, the familiarity rather unfortunately reminded me of insanely great shows, thereby making this good, but not spectacular show, pale in comparison.I tried desperately to separate this show from others so that I could give it an objective review, but at every turn, something reminded me of something else. That isn't to say that pilot was bad, it just wasn't the unique, original experience I was hoping for and kind of expecting from J.J. Along with the constant comparisons, for me, it was largely the little things that made the pilot fall into "good" territory rather than "spectacular" territory. The premise itself has a hell of a lot of potential, but the execution is what worries me most.
The tone and pacing of the pilot were probably the biggest problems. As with any pilot, a lot of plot exposition and premise explanation has to go on, the actors are trying to figure out their characters, and the audience is trying to build a construct for how they are going to interpret the show. This is bound to cause some problems and disconnects, but for a pilot to be successful, the powers that be need to have a firm grasp of the tone they're trying to set. I think Fringe only has a fair handle of the tone they're aiming for and the pacing of the pilot didn't help solidify their stance.
The pilot opens with a plane that's in trouble. Now J.J., if you're trying to decrease the amount of comparison between this show and your other projects, maybe starting out with a flight in peril wasn't the best plan of action. You won't be able to top the Lost pilot, so it's best you not remind viewers that that is the gold standard. It starts off normal enough, and it may just be my cynical conditioning at work, but when one passenger offered another passenger a piece of gum and held up the pack, I was fully expecting some not-so-subtle product placement and we weren't even 10 minutes in. I was just waiting for something like this:
"Would you like a piece of Icebreakers' new Spearmint Fusion gum? The flavor will awaken your senses in a blast of ecstasy."
"Why yes, yes I would! You say this fine product can be found at any local convenience store? Fanstastic! All my worries have just melted away in a cascade of minty bliss. Thank you, Icebreakers Gum!"
Thankfully that didn't happen, but it already made tone an issue for me. Fortunately (well, maybe not "fortunately" exactly), the flight quickly turned ooey gooey when everyone on board started melting, so I figured we were on the right track again.
Yeah, not so much. Anna Torv, who plays FBI Agent Hot Blond, is apparently the emotional basis for the show as the audience is subjected to her and FBI Agent Hunky Love Interest professing their love for one another. Yet again, I might be too conditioned to TV here, but I knew that guy was either in trouble or was trouble the second he told her he loved her. I immediately tho
ught he'd be killed off and as it turned out, I wasn't too far off the mark.Hunky Love Interest (John) gets the ball rolling when he basically gets blown up and Hot Blond (Olivia) has to save him. From how the show was hyped, I was really expecting a new and unique experience, but I found familiarity and even predictability (the real showkiller) around just about every corner. Enter Pacey and his wacky father (both of whom just so happen to be geniuses). Hot Blond needs their help to save Whatshisname, and we spend the rest of the pilot watching this go down.
As far as a pilot premise goes, that's all fine and dandy, but yet again, the execution was flawed. There was no build up to the John/Olivia relationship, so the audience really doesn't care that he's in danger. Further, Olivia, whose most memorable qualities include an inability to smile and an unintentional wealth of accents to rival the UN (seriously, I spent half the pilot trying to decide if her character was American, British, Scottish, Australian or some combination thereof--the accent changed more and more the longer the sentences got), doesn't have the emotional pull to make the audience want to root for her. Unlike Alias, where Jennifer Garner's devastation over her fiance's murder completely pulled the audience in, I found myself watching Olivia's plight more as a simple point A to point B plot device rather than the heart of the operation. I did enjoy that she wasn't a sappy, sentimental crusader, though. It was nice to see that in spite of her personal attachment to John and the main plotline, she conducted herself professionally (even if a bit blandly).
That Olivia, as a character, falls a bit flat (at least so far) wouldn't be too much of an issue if the other characters were more engaging. Which isn't to say that they were completely unsuccessful, but none of them made me desperate to tune in next week. I found the crazy father to be inconsistent (which I guess was the point?) and serving more as a screwball technique to force all these people together than a fully-realized character. Truly, Pacey, whose character's name was... Peter? I think? Pacey it is. His character had the most promise for me, and even then, his overweening trait was a bit off-putting. There was a sporadic snottiness that infused most of his interaction with others that didn't seem intrinsic so much as forced. Which, perhaps that's who his character is. He puts on a front and isn't very good at it. If that's the case, then he did a hell of a job. Most of his snottiness felt out of place in the context of what was going on, and while he had some very entertaining lines, I found myself liking his character the most when he was genuine and real. Which we all know I'm a big lover of snark, so for me to connect most with a character when he's not being a smarmy jackass truly was an original experience for me, so I guess at least I didn't see that coming... I'm most intrigued to see how his character turns out after a few episodes. Thus far, I'm really hoping I just read him wrong. That the audience doesn't necessarily like these characters off the bat does have a certain appeal, but I think I'm going to need more development before I really care about any of them and can appreciate the character, even if I don't exactly like the character.
With only the pilot to base things on, it all felt a little too X-Filesy for purely nostalgic purposes. Olivia
and Pacey are the Mulder and Scully of the series respectively, but the problem is, Mulder and Scully they are not [pictured at left, and apparently "the truth" is out there, you know, to the right]... Particularly with Pacey's character, I kept thinking, "Why Scully, you've gotten snottier..." It was distracting to see the Mulder "I want to believe"/ Scully "It doesn't matter how many aliens I run into, I still don't believe" dynamic presented again, but with less successful results. If I didn't have the X-Files as a rubric for how such characters should interact, I think I would have appreciated Fringe much more and the experience would have been fresher and more engaging.The pilot as a whole was good, but not great. Even the areas where I found myself becoming genuinely interested in the show had an irksome familiarity to them. The experiment, which I found to be the most effective part of the first hour (it was a 90 minute pilot), was interesting and all, but unoriginal. The pacing started to pick up and I was interested to see how the shared dream state would work out. Turns out, it worked out just exactly the way it did in The Cell, and even had a similar visual motif. I became sure the shared dream state would feature Jennifer Lopez in at least one capacity or another [insert cold shudder]. Fortunately (VERY fortunately), it didn't, but knowing the threat (a
nd I mean Threat Level RED here, people) was out there certainly didn't help me enjoy the show and kind of broke down the fourth wall for me.All in all, watching Fringe was kind of like watching your best friend perform in the school talent show. Okay, that makes it sound positively god-awful, and that's not what I meant. Compounding the hype, the anticipation, and my appreciation for J.J.'s past works (aside from Armageddon, naturally) made me approach the show with so much hope that I found myself almost willing it to be everything I had dreamed. "Come onnnn, don't suck! Come onnnn, don't suck!" Which it genuinely didn't, but definitely could have been better, even with my allegiances willing it to be fantastic.
Long story short, I wasn't blown away by the pilot, but I think the show definitely has potential. The last 30 minutes sucked me in much more than the first hour, and in spite of knowing exactly whose voice would be on the tape in one last spasm of predictability, I'm genuintely intrigued to see what happens next. There is a lot that could be done with this show and I think once everyone gets on the same page regarding tone and character development, it could be a real classic. I'll be sticking with it for at least the next few episodes, although I hear the premiere only attracted 9 million viewers (as opposed to Lost, which premiered with about twice that), so with Fox at the helm, it might only be on for the next few weeks. Damn Fox. I'm still bitter about Firefly...
Overall, I give the Fringe pilot a B-.
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